from his capital at madrid, philip iv ruled the greatest empire in the world, with dominions stretching from the philippines to peru, but bogged down by a long war in the netherlands, the most powerful state in europe was about to slip into decline. at a time beset with uncertainty, the arts flourished. of the painters he met at philip's court, rubens was particularly impressed by one-- the young diego velazquez. velazquez was an original who would paint a classical subject like bacchus getting drunk, with a group of real peasants. velazquez first drew the court's attention with his early paintings of daily life, what we call genre paintings. they were startling pictures, depicting things never before painted, such as the precise moment at which cooking eggs solidified. like many young painters of his time, velazquez was profoundly influenced by the naturalism of the italian, caravaggio. caravaggio placed miraculous events in a familiar, naturalistic setting. velazquez fused the real and the mythological to create a new psychologically penetrating reality. in the forge of vulcan, he cho